Saturday, December 7, 2013

Illuminating Gracie

Title:Illuminating
Gracie

Author:Lisa C. Temple

Pages:299

Year:2013

Publisher: Self-published

Grace Bennett has just landed the job of a lifetime in her
eyes.She will be making more money over
the summer months than she dreamed possible.Grace has just a few weeks of high school left and vows she will buckle
down and graduate to impress her new employer and to make sure they let her
keep her job.After all, they wouldn’t
want to hire a high school drop-out, right?She has had a lot of trouble doing her assignments, not because of the
difficulty of the subjects, but more because she has been told she has to do
it.She has been tested and found to
have a genius IQ.Grace’s new employer
is Mrs. B.Willem and his grandson,
Locke, make Grace feel comfortable and welcome at their home.The handsome Merc, who also lives on the
property, seems to be surrounded by a darkness that Grace senses right away,
but she also is attracted to him so she doesn’t heed her instinct to steer
clear of him.What develops as the story
progresses is a battle between good and evil/angels and demons, a battle for
Grace’s very soul.There are lots of ups
and downs and ins and outs, action and even a little romance, but if I start
telling about one thing, it will lead to another and then readers won’t have
the enjoyment of discovering this book on their own.

There were a couple of things I didn’t like about this book:1) The use of the Lord’s name in vain, and 2)
The theme of having faith in oneself instead of having faith in God.I did like that Grace’s sarcasm is great and
funny.It is also used to cover up her
insecurities and self-pity.I think most
readers can readily identify with using that as a defense mechanism.Her inner dialogues with herself are downright
hysterically funny!Grace has some
definite problems with authority, an OCD complex, counts to herself to calm her
panic and a lot of the usual teenage angst.It made me remember my own teenage years, and thank the good Lord I am
an adult now!While this is geared
toward a young adult audience, I think many adult readers will be entertained
by this supernatural fictional tale.

Why we do what we do

When this blog began it was during a time of raising my sons and care taking for ailing inlaws. Before those seasons ended this blog morphed into writing reviews and interviewing authors. With the constant change in the Christian publishing industry and our society, our purpose expanded.

With my girlfriend coming alongside, we review all sorts of novels, hunting for sound stories. While there are a couple genres we will not review for several reasons, we remain open to looking into new opportunities to read and share about good books!

In all of what we do we aim to bring glory to God and Christ Jesus in the ministry of blogging which we believe He has blessed us to do. We are always amazed that we get to wake up and do something with such profound joy each and everyday.